Swiss team plans to fly solar plane all night

June 17, 2010
Huge solar powered plane takes to the air

Enlarge

(AP) -- A Swiss team hoping to fly a solar-powered plane around the world in 2012 says it plans to take a prototype for an all-night spin later this month.

The team, led by adventurer Bertrand Piccard, says it will try to fly the Solar Impulse nonstop for 24 hours as part of its test program.

It says the pilot, Andre Borschberg, will need to conserve enough during the day to make it through the night.

Borschberg says being able to fly through the night will allow the plane to stay airborne for successive cycles and come close to permitting perpetual flight.

Team spokeswoman Rachel Bros de Puechredon said Tuesday the exact date of the test flight will depend on the .

Copyright © 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

3.8 /5 (5 votes)  

Filter


Move the slider to adjust rank threshold, so that you can hide some of the comments.


Display comments: newest first

Javinator
Jun 18, 2010

Rank: not rated yet
I wonder which direction it's flying in and at what speed. That would have a big effect on the amount of sun exposure during the 24hours.
Rank 3.8 /5 (5 votes)
Related Stories
Relevant PhysicsForums posts
  • Calling function with no input argument
    created11 hours ago
  • Force free body diagram problem on gym equipment
    created12 hours ago
  • Empirical data regarding shower heads and water
    created20 hours ago
  • feed hold button on CNC lathe
    createdFeb 09, 2012
  • RFAC in Fortran
    createdFeb 09, 2012
  • dynamics 2/32
    createdFeb 08, 2012
  • More from Physics Forums - General Engineering

More news stories

Google users warned of threat to smartphone wallets

Users of Google smartphone wallets were being warned on Friday that there is a way to crack pass codes intended to thwart thieves from going on illicit shopping sprees.

Technology / Internet

created 4 hours ago | popularity 5 / 5 (2) | comments 0

Anonymous knocks CIA website offline (Update)

The website of the Central Intelligence Agency was inaccessible on Friday after the hacker group Anonymous claimed to have knocked it offline.

Technology / Internet

created 5 hours ago | popularity 5 / 5 (7) | comments 11

New error-correcting codes guarantee the fastest possible rate of data transmission

Error-correcting codes are one of the triumphs of the digital age. They’re a way of encoding information so that it can be transmitted across a communication channel — such as an optical fiber o ...

Technology / Computer Sciences

created 14 hours ago | popularity 4.8 / 5 (6) | comments 6 | with audio podcast

New power source discovered

(PhysOrg.com) -- Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and RMIT University have made a breakthrough in energy storage and power generation.

Technology / Energy & Green Tech

created 13 hours ago | popularity 4.8 / 5 (21) | comments 7 | with audio podcast

Small modular reactor design could be a 'SUPERSTAR'

(PhysOrg.com) -- Though most of today's nuclear reactors are cooled by water, we've long known that there are alternatives; in fact, the world's first nuclear-powered electricity in 1951 came from a reactor ...

Technology / Energy & Green Tech

created 13 hours ago | popularity 4.3 / 5 (11) | comments 20 | with audio podcast


Complex wiring of the nervous system may rely on a just a handful of genes and proteins

Researchers at the Salk Institute have discovered a startling feature of early brain development that helps to explain how complex neuron wiring patterns are programmed using just a handful of critical genes. ...

The power of estrogen -- male snakes attract other males

A new study has shown that boosting the estrogen levels of male garter snakes causes them to secrete the same pheromones that females use to attract suitors, and turned the males into just about the sexiest ...

Putting the squeeze on planets outside our solar system

(PhysOrg.com) -- Using high-powered lasers, scientists at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and collaborators discovered that molten magnesium silicate undergoes a phase change in the liquid state, abruptly ...

Humans may have helped the decline of African rainforests 3000 years ago

(PhysOrg.com) -- Large areas of rainforests in Central Africa mysteriously disappeared over three thousand years ago, to be replaced by savannas. The prevailing theory has been that the cause was a change ...

NASA sees wide-eyed cyclone Jasmine

Cyclone Jasmine's eye has opened wider on NASA satellite imagery, as it moves through the Southern Pacific Ocean.

Grass to gas: Researchers' genome map speeds biofuel development

Researchers at the University of Georgia have taken a major step in the ongoing effort to find sources of cleaner, renewable energy by mapping the genomes of two originator cells of Miscanthus x giganteus, a large perenn ...